The 2010
Illinois Governor’s race promises to be quite a brawl — but that must wait
until after the February primary mob action among Republican gubernatorial
wannabes. Five men have announced their candidacy as Republicans but the early
favorite — at least according to conventional wisdom — seems to be state
senator Kirk Dillard of Hinsdale.

Dillard is
what was once common-place in GOP circles, the so-called country club
Republican. He’s a baby-boomer born and raised as a middle-class child of a
high school history teacher in comfortable suburban Chicago, the traditional
womb of traditional Republicans in DuPage county.

Kirk
Dillard dropped by to talk with the Zephyr for an hour and a half last week. He
is affable, smart, articulate and charming and comes off as a political realist
who understands how politics works and also how it’s supposed to work. Dillard
is also a morally unambiguous politician who claims a strong record of
supporting integrity and honesty in government. Being a legislative leader in
ethics reform in a town like Springfield is sort of like being Sheriff Andy
Taylor thrust into mid-19th century Dodge City. But in a post-Blagojevich world
against a Democratic reform incumbent and in a state reeling from self-serving
abuses of power, Dillard thinks he just might be the right guy at the right
time for his party.

Dillard
portrays himself as a Reagan Republican who can grow the Illinois economy out
of the recession without the need to raise taxes. “I expect to spend the lion's
share of my time as governor doing economic development for Illinois,” says
Dillard. “We need an attitudinal change in this state so we begin sending the
message that we are an attractive destination for business.”

He believes
that by bringing back jobs and industry to Illinois the state will generate the
necessary revenues to fund services and infrastructure without additional taxes
or fees. Like most of the Republican aspirants seeking the governor’s office,
Dillard has pledged to balance the state budget, pay off the state debt and not
raise taxes. Also like his colleagues, Dillard is hazy on just how that can be
accomplished beyond making Illinois “a more business friendly destination.”

A lawyer by
training and a partner at a major Chicago law firm, Dillard has devoted most of
his professional life to politics. He has worked closely with two former
Republican governors — as director of legislative affairs in Jim Thompson's
first term and as Jim Edgar's chief of staff from 1991 on. The shenanigans he
witnessed in the operation of both those administrations plus the better-know
ethical lapses of George Ryan and Rod Blagojevich, who followed them, have
turned Dillard into a hawk on ethics issues.

As Edgar's
chief of staff, Dillard shares in his mentor's budget record. Under Edgar,
Dillard claims Illinois budgets were slashed to bring the budget into balance
and pay off state debt. “Since Jim Edgar left office no one has been managing
the finances of this state at all. In the last six years of total Democratic
rule in Springfield we have seen a 33 percent increase in the state budget. We
have a spending problem – not a revenue problem! The best way to turn this
state around financially is to grow our economy by nurturing business.” (While
Dillard’s 33 percent increase sounds enormous, figures from the state’s Bureau
of the Budget don’t back them up at all. They show virtually no increase in
budget totals from 2003 to 2010 and actual decreases in recent years.)

Dillard
blames a perceived bad business climate on the lack of prosperity in this state
as well as the loss of jobs. “We have made Illinois a very business unfriendly
place.” He pledges to reduce the cost of doing business in Illinois by
developing employer incentives to reduce the “fractional costs” of doing
business here. Dillard's fractional costs include high utility rates and
utility taxes, high worker's compensation costs, excessive unemployment
insurance costs and a high corporate income tax rate. He promises to convene a
summit of experts in Springfield to propose the necessary changes to make
Illinois a “destination economy” for business.

“We need to
incorporate those good ideas and programs that have worked well elsewhere such
as the Louisiana success story under governor Bobby Jindal. There's no
copyright on good ideas created in other states and I want to bring the best to
Illinois.”

Earlier
this month, Dillard's former boss, Jim Edgar, endorsed his candidacy and
pointed out how invaluable he was when Edgar tackled an earlier Illinois budget
mess but Edgar added, “State government finances are terrible, far worse
probably than what I walked into in 1991.”

But not
everything about this endorsement was peaches and cream for Dillard. While
Dillard said at that endorsement event, “the very last thing you ever look at
or talk about are taxes,” Edgar noted, “any politician who blindly rules out
any tax increase is being foolish and irresponsible.” The former governor also
said that same day, “you can find and cut out all the waste in state government
and I don't think you will make a dent in the current state budget deficit.”

It’s not
just tax policy on which Edgar and Dillard disagree. Jim Edgar was very much a
moderate, if not liberal, on most social issues, Dillard is not. “I am solidly
pro-life, pro-gun and anti-gay marriage.”

Beyond
restoring ethics to Illinois state government and balancing the state budget
through cuts and creation of a better business climate, the third major focus
of Dillard’s campaign is education. He promises a series of “best in class”
reforms to be worked out by yet another blue ribbon panel devoted to fixing
Illinois’ education policies. “We need to go through the school code
line-by-line, not unlike our thorough review of Illinois' criminal statutes
just a few years ago. It is imperative that we return the focus of Illinois
classrooms to teaching our children those core subjects of reading, writing,
history, math and science. Our children don't spend enough time in classrooms
and too little of the time they do spend there is devoted to these core
subjects. Part of my commitment to improving Illinois' business attractiveness
is by producing a better-educated workforce; particularly in science and
technology that will be the center point of our future economy.”

Dillard
recognizes that the current method of financing education in Illinois is broken
and he is in favor of increasing the foundation level of funding in elementary
and secondary education. “We need to simplify the school funding formula and
reorganize our schools and school districts to most effectively teach our
children.” He also believes that Illinois high schools need to bring back a
modernized version of vocational education with a curriculum developed in
concert with Illinois system of community colleges. And finally Dillard feels
very strongly that more attention and funding is badly needed by our state
system of higher education.

Along with
most of his Springfield colleagues, Dillard was and is a major proponent of the
$31 billion capital projects bill and he has criticized governor Quinn for
moving too slowly to sell the bonds and get started on the long list of capital
projects (such as Galesburg's over-/under- passes or the completion of highway
34). One area of infrastructure in particular that Dillard supports in
passenger rail, including high-speed rail between Chicago and St. Louis. “I am
strongly committed to passenger rail and believe that major expansion of
passenger rail is critical as an environmentally responsible approach as well
as a key economic factor in Illinois and America's economic future.”

Finally,
Dillard is trying hard to demonstrate that he is not just another metro-Chicago
politician. He says he knows and cares about downstate Illinois — and more
specifically western Illinois. He received his BA in political science at
Western Illinois University and he has remained a major supporter of that
school ever since. “WIU was a major turning point in my life and my experience
at the university has provided me with a much better understanding of Illinois
outside of the Chicago region.”